Online mortgage application processor Blend raises $100M in new round

A San Francisco-based startup called Blend that aims to simplify the mortgage application process has just raised a hefty $100 million funding round to help it achieve that goal.

The company said the round was led by Greylock, with participation from several existing investors including Emergence Capital, 8VC, Lightspeed Venture Partners and Nyca Partners. The round brings Blend’s total funding to date to $166 million.

Blend was founded in 2012, and has created technology used by a number of banks to collect and evaluate data to be used in their mortgage underwriting process.

Basically, what Blend’s software does is enable the mortgage application process to be handled entirely online. The benefits of this is that everything is simpler and more convenient for both lenders and their customers, and results in less errors along the way. Besides this, Blend’s infrastructure also helps lenders to keep track of mortgage applications while they’re in progress, and makes it easier for the applicants themselves to get updates on the status of their applications.

Blend reckons its business has expanded rapidly in recent years as more banks look to offer mortgage services online. The company says its customer base has tripled in the last 18 months, and has handled over $30 billion worth of mortgage applications in the same period.

With the new cash injection, Blend says it wants to expand its technology into other lending projects besides mortgages.